Biafra, Jello - Audacity of Hype

The album explores how the forced Iraqnophobia and Homeland Insecurity continues to feed lawlessness at the top ("The Terror of Tiny Town") vs. a runaway police state and class war toward the bottom ("Three Strikes" and "Electronic Plantation," originally done by The No WTO Combo, Biafra's one-off collaboration with Krist Novelselic and Kim Thayil). "Clean as a Thistle" becomes more timely every day as "family values" blowhards from Sanford to Berlusconi are caught in sinful trysts, while album closer "I Won't Give Up" offers an Age of Obama anthem on how change comes from agitation from below, not from glamour and sound bites from the top. Thirty years on, Biafra solidifies and expands his uncompromising vision and updates it for the new century, with a powerhouse band that promises to be a terrifying live machine. Jon Weiss's brother Andrew (Rollins Band, Ween, Butthole Surfers) has filled the live bass position recently left vacant by Gould's return to Faith No More.